WTF is a MGTOW? A Glossary

On this blog, MRA does not mean Magnetic Resonance Angiography

For newcomers to this blog, here’s a handy guide to some of the strange acronyms and lingo you’ll encounter here and in the “manosphere” in general. (For a definition of that term, see below.) I will update this entry periodically as needed.

First, the acronyms you’ll see most often here:

MRA: Men’s Rights ActivistMRM: Men’s Rights Movement

MGTOW: Men Going Their Own Way MGHOW: Man Going His Own Way.

Ok, so what do those terms mean?

MRM: TheMen’s Rights Movement: A loosely defined, but largely retrograde, collection of activists and internet talkers who fight for what they see as “men’s rights.” Unlike the original Men’s Movement, which was inspired by and heavily influenced by feminism, the self-described Men’s Rights Movement is largely a reactionary movement; with few exceptions, Men’s Rights Activists (or MRAs) are pretty rabidly antifeminist, and many are frankly and sometimes proudly misogynistic. Those who oppose the MRM are generally not against men’s rights per se; they are opposed to those who’ve turned those two words into a synonym for some pretty backwards notions.

MGTOW: Men Going Their Own Way: As the name suggests, MGTOW is a lot like lesbian separatism, but for straight dudes. MGTOW often talk vaguely about seeking “independence” from western and/or consumer culture, and a few MGTOW try to live that sort of zen existence. But most of those who embrace the term have a deep hostility towards and/or profound distrust of feminists and women in general. Many MGTOW refuse to date “western women” and some try to avoid women altogether. I think the Man Going His Own Way acronym MGHOW adds another layer of confusion to an already awkward acronym, so I use MGTOWer instead.

Some other terms and acronyms you’ll run across here:

Anglosphere: Countries in which English is the primary language, or, more narrowly, those countries that used to be British colonies. They are full of evil Western Women (see below).

Incel: Involuntarily Celibate. A term, and identity, adopted by some dateless guys (as well as some women, but it’s the men we’ll focus on here). While there is nothing shameful about being dateless, or a virgin, or having a really long dry spell sexually — most of us have been there at some point — the term “involuntarily celibate” seems to suggest that the world owes incels sex, and that women who turn down incel men for dates or sex are somehow oppressing them. For those (male, straight) incels who are genuinely socially awkward or phobic, this can be a self-defeating stance that can lead to bitterness towards women. And often does.

Mangina: Derogatory term used by MRAs, MGTOW, etc. to describe guys who disagree with them — e.g., me. You can figure out the various connotations of this term yourself.

The Manosphere: The loose collection of blogs, message boards, and other sites run by and/or read by MRAs, MGTOW, and assorted friendly Pick-up Artists. The primary source of material for this blog.

NAWALT: Not All Women Are Like That. Dudes in the manosphere make so many ridiculous and untrue generalizations about women that they’ve come up with their own little acronym to describe the most common reaction to their nonsense: “not all women are like that.” Remarkably, many seem to think that making a reference to NAWALT is actually some sort of clever rebuttal of their critics.

PUA: Pick-up Artist. PUAs are obsessed with mastering what they see as the ultimate set of techniques and attitudes — known as “Game” — that will enable them to quickly seduce almost any woman they want. There is a vast literature on “game” online, though PUA (insofar as it is not complete bullshit) is at its essence simply a male version of the age-old ploy of “playing hard to get.”

Western Women: Also known as WW. Evil harpies, at least according to many in the manosphere. Contrasted with “foreign women,” a term that (in the manosphere, at least) sometimes refers to all women outside the Anglosphere, but often refers to a subset of these women from poor and/or Eastern countries, mostly Asian, who are regarded as more pliable and thus more desirable to haters of “Ameriskanks” and other WW.

That’s… rather interesting. Can’t tell if that’s a good thing or not. O_O

@Aktivarum:

I’m pretty sure the default assumption is that people are telling the truth about their own personal situation. To do otherwise is to do what police have always done in rape cases; assume the victim is lying when zie can’t provide photographic evidence zie was raped (and sometimes even assume then).

But if a story were particularly unbelievable, such as someone claiming to have been raped by police (why hello, strawmonster), it would be met with skepticism. And ever single one of those fake stories strikes a blow at the effort to get rape treated more seriously, because its just another gotcha that proponents of the status quo can use to cherry pick their opinion that rape isn’t all that big a problem.

The assumption is that, with the amount of shit that victims are given in today’s culture, someone wouldn’t willingly claim to have been raped unless it actually happened. In fact, the assumption (a supported one) is that most people who have been raped don’t step forward about it. And feminism is trying to change that.

No, the prosecutor is trying to find out IF the defendant is guilty. Its not the prosecutors job to prove people are guilty regardless – Although that IS a great description for what Mike Nifong did in the Duke-Lacrosse case.

Wrong. It’s an adversarial system. That’s one of the reasons it’s so fucked up. Do some research.

No. Not guilty is not the same as innocent, just as you admitted with the four cops who beat Rodney King. As further proof, they were convicted, by a different court, of a related crime (because no matter how guilty, once convicted they can’t be tried again. Even if they confess).

The legal maxim is, “better that 10 guilty men go free, than one innocent man should suffer”.

No, the prosecutor is trying to find out IF the defendant is guilty.

No. The proescutor, in a reasonable system, has to be convinced the accused is guilty (beyond some level of defined doubt, in the US/UK systems the level of doubt required is defined as, “reasonable”. I don’t know about Sweden. In France they are required to a slightly higher level of reasonable, because they are supposed to have enough grounds to say someone is guilty; and the accused must show a lack of guilt, but I digress; on topic, unlike your digressions into non-relevant, and non-sensical asides).

If a prosecutor doesn’t believe the accused to be guilty (in both the US and the UK) they are obliged to drop the charges. Your example, actually undermines your argument, as the problem in the Duke Case is that the prosecution lacked the means to prove guilt, and so the case was dropped. That Nifong was disbarred is exactly counter to your theory of the way the law works.

So, once again, you are either mistaken, or prevaricating. i.e. you are wrong, or a liar.

Howard Bannister: It’s not the adversarial nature of the system which is fucking it up. It’s fucked up because the State has a lot more money/time/resources than the defendant.

In the US the use of plea bargains allows the State even more power… because a prosecutor can afford to “over-charge” and plead down to what they think the real crime was. The defendant can’t afford the cost of the trial, and worse can’t afford the risk of losing at the higher charge.

So it’s almost certain a significant number of people convicted of crime are not guilty of them, and may even be innocent. That the police are skilled at testimony, given great credit by juries, have structural advantages in interrogation; which makes it easier to get a statement which looks incriminating (even discounting the ease of extracting a false confession) and the deck is stacked against the defendant.

Which makes the low rates of prosecution, much less conviction, of rape all the more telling.

No, the prosecutor is trying to find out IF the defendant is guilty. Its not the prosecutors job to prove people are guilty regardless – Although that IS a great description for what Mike Nifong did in the Duke-Lacrosse case.

You are wrong. You could probably say that it’s the police’s job to find out if the defendant might be guilty, but a prosecutor steps into the court room with a concept of why the defendant should be convicted, and tries to prove that case in front of a jury. I don’t know how to explain it any clearer than that.

Again, you are wrong. Failing to prove that someone committed a crime does not prove that they didn’t do it. Otherwise, how could someone be proven to be guilty long after a court had found them not guilty? If you proved innocence, then you couldn’t later find out they were guilty.

Why does this matter in the case of rape? Because rape is a crime that is very difficult to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, especially if you hold the notion that women tend to lie about not wanting sex to play hard to get or something. It’s way too common for a rape to occur, then for the case to be dropped by the police or not enough evidence found in a court room. And then MRAs claim that the charge was false, and want to stigmatize an actual rape victim as a liar.

What “not guilty” means matters, because “not guilty” does not prove that the accusation was false, or that the victim was lying. And it matters because it’s far too common for rape charges to be dropped through lack of evidence or because the authorities involved have the per-conceived notion that the victim is lying.

TL;DR version–prosecutors outright ignoring the Brady rule. Holding evidence that suggests the defendant was innocent–not even turning it over to the Defense.

“A 2003 study by the Center of Public Integrity, which the students cite, found more than 2,000 appeals since 1970 in which prosecutorial misconduct prompted dismissals, sentence reductions, or reversals.”

Hmmm.

But then this gets into a huge philisophical discussion about how to make the adversarial system fair, whether there are any workable alternatives to the adversarial system–in terms of history, it’s a fairly new idea, and we know that it’s worlds better than what it replaced. But does that make it the best?

But I wouldn’t want to get into that anywhere near Aktivarum. Because somehow that’ll just prove his point. By disproving it. Which proves it.

Plus, I don’t cite enough studies. So I must be wrong. (even when it seems like every other thing he posts actually undermines his point…)

Ohh and do call it “rape survival” although the NORMAL result of rape is not death. That really is what propaganda-people would do.

Rape survivors have survived a life threatening situation. I think it makes perfect sense for them to use the word survivor. Some people don’t like using the word victim for themselves, because our culture stigmatizes victimization as making a person weak. Some other people here in Joplin prefer the term tornado victors instead of victims. I personally don’t have a preference of saying tornado victim, victor, or survivor, but I do respect the terms that other people want to use for themselves.

By the way, one of the definitions of survivor is “a person who continues to function or prosper in spite of opposition, hardship, or setbacks. “. So stop trying to decide who gets to use the word survival and for what situations.

Any opinion on him being guilty or innocent of crime is bs compared to the supreme court decision based on the evidence. We can have opinion on the actions – not whether they constitute a crime. The public cant declare anyone a criminal.

No, the public can’t make a legal decision on whether or not someone is guilty or pass out a punishment for a crime. You agree, though, that the public can think whatever they want about a case. It’s okay for Nancy Grace to say she believes Casey Anthony is guilty of murder, but she doesn’t have the legal authority to punish Anthony.

If the courts declare him innocent and you claim he is guilty and spread that opinion then you are saying even when declared innocent you are free to treat him as a criminal.

Again, there are no thought crimes, so private citizens can think what they want to think. I also have freedom of speech. I am allowed to say I think OJ is guilty even though he was acquitted. I am not treating him as a criminal. I am not giving him a legal punishment like a court can. I’m just saying what I believe is true.

Of course private citizens are not allowed to punish people they believe to be criminals. That’s vigilantism, and it’s illegal. They are allowed to say they think they’re guilty, though.

In what way does that matter? The point being we should not have any peoples court at all. Public Opinion on crime should not matter. Innocent means innocent.

In a country with a free press, people are going to talk and write a lot of opinions on high profile court cases. When someone famous like Assange gets accused of a crime, it gets a lot of media coverage, and the general public is going to form their own opinions. Sometimes a person will be acquitted of a crime, and the public will still dislike hir. I don’t know how you can prevent that without taking away the freedom of press and freedom of speech.

It would be dangerous to allow governments to arrest people in secret, too. If court cases were held in secret, then governments could abuse that power and start prosecuting people for made up crimes. It’s better to have public scrutiny for our criminal justice system.

“Science is not a view, Science is a method finding things out that may support several views. The scientific solution to this is called testing.”

Thanks for telling me wtf all that college was for, and in relevant things scientific claims are unproven (or not 100% proven) claims, ergo the phrase “we’ve been making…science claims” makes perfect sense.

“The political solution to this is called democracy.”

Um, politics is not science. It truly does not matter whether that’s democracy, monarchy, communism, or anything else — none of them are supported by scientific testing (we went through the whole “can morality be empirically proven” thing last week, I can find you the link if you can learn to read for meaning).

“1. When you (people in general) attack a view, you support an own view, Some (not in general) people saying what is bad just dont wanna say what they think would be good.
2. Most links offered here (not in general real world) are not own views but attacks. Telling what is wrong while not telling what is right.”

Please review the tangent about FGM — if something is bad, then not doing it is good — this is simple enough my cousin’s 5 year old could handle it.

“3. I started demand citations when people started demanding them of me (lots of pics) while not demanding them of other people.”

Nobody provided “lots of pics” until my comment about what rape really looks like. In other words, no one did “lots of pics” until 2 weeks into this.

“4. When I say things are anecdotal it is about them being chosen. For instance “none of my friends voted Bush” would mean you dont choose friends voting for Bush. It would say nothing of the pulling results.”

And Jessay provided you with a newspaper article saying the same thing, you ignored it. (It’s here if you want to try that one again)

“Actually I am the kind that needs to be told not only what is wrong with what I know but what is right with what YOU know. Thus if you for example criticize my country you better have a country with better results. Don t attack Usain Bolts running style!”

First, sports? Red herring! Second, so you are daft enough to not see “what you are doing is wrong and you should stop” as remotely helpful advice. Like I said, scary.

“I deal with what – based on things we know – is more propable to work in real life. Your obsession with not knowing is close to the postmodern wish the people thinking we cant know anything should be the real experts.”

Argh, no, I said no one can know everything, and refusing to acknowledge the things you don’t know is the scariest kind of lack of knowledge. Someone who knows they don’t know something is easy to teach, someone who insists they don’t need to know things will never learn.

you — “If people build cars by telliing what is wrong with other cars you would not even be able to drive a car today cause people would never build them – they would just sabotage competiton.”
me — “Oh and btw? Engineering a good percentage not making the same mistakes the other guy did.”
you — “Well, not doing anything at all would obviously mean never making any of the mistakes the other guy doing something did thus people not building shit would be great engineers.”

You did not say “If people build cars by telliing what is wrong with other cars you would not even be able to drive a car today cause people would never build them – they would just stop building.” — you said sabotage, that’s not the same as “not doing anything at all”. We can all still scroll up and see what you said last, not that I haven’t told you that at least three times now.

“Its the same reason some idiots say women dont cause wars. They see war as a mistake women doing almost nothing – did not do.”

Your second sentence is gibberish, the lack of connection between “They see war as a mistake” and “women doing almost nothing” makes is incomprehensible. Your first sentence is typical nonsense ignoring that politicians cause wars (or at least community/group leaders, eg Kings).

“Which public are you talking about? The population in general or just some more visible people in media and other places?”

Those of us commenting here, those of us you where trying to insist must use the “innocent until proven guilty” standard — we don’t have to, we are not legally involved.

“Any opinion on him being guilty or innocent of crime is bs compared to the supreme court decision based on the evidence. We can have opinion on the actions – not whether they constitute a crime. The public cant declare anyone a criminal.”

A decision they haven’t made yet, so nice try, but irrelevant. Also, false, as Pecunium had tried displaying with examples. As for the last sentence, we know, that’s why it doesn’t matter what we think. We’re entitled to whatever opinion we like, because that’s all it is, an opinion.

“You were discussing whether or not he was guilty of a crime. You cant treat him as guilty if the court declare him innocent. We dont have “thought laws” so feel happy to think he is a criminal.”

First, yeah, we can, everyone here so far has said the cops who beat Rodney King are guilty, regardless what the court said. Further, that is not what thought crime means. In fact, your insistence we can’t even think Assange might be guilty is much closer to thought crime —

crimethink – To even consider any thought not in line with the principles of Ingsoc. Doubting any of the principles of Ingsoc. All crimes begin with a thought. So, if you control thought, you can control crime. “Thoughtcrime is death. Thoughtcrime does not entail death, Thoughtcrime is death…. The essential crime that contains all others in itself.”

“If the courts declare him innocent and you claim he is guilty and spread that opinion then you are saying even when declared innocent you are free to treat him as a criminal.”

Considering the slim odds any of us will ever meet Assange, it doesn’t really matter whether we treat him as a criminal now, or after he’s found innocent, or after he’s found guilty — do you intent to admit he might be a rapist if they find him guilty btw?

“Any opinion expressed in this thread is not the opinion of anyone legally involved in the Assange case”

In what way does that matter? The point being we should not have any peoples court at all. Public Opinion on crime should not matter. Innocent means innocent.

You really are a special kind of stupid — public opinion on criminal does not matter, thus we can hold whatever views we like as long as we are not legally involved. As we are not legally involved, we can hold whatever views we like. And innocent in court can also mean not enough evidence, or bias, or other things that do not equal “did not do it” — eg the Rodney King case, that they beat him has never been disputed, the question was whether that was legal guilt, and so far 3 of us have said we think the cops were guilty regardless what the court said.

“Legally, yep, but we weren’t making legally binding opinions.”

No you are talking a about peoples court. Or perhaps experts court. Most of the time they do not present representativ statistics in these “media courts”

I’m not talking about court at all! I’m talking about public opinion — unless you suddenly think I’m endorsing vigilante justice, public opinion has absolutely no legal bearing. (And since you’re a bit thick, let me be clear, I am not endorsing vigilante justice)

“In court that’s about half true, in public opinion? *dies laughing* You ever read a court case before? I’m guessing not, or you’d realize just how foolish some defendants are”

Yes I have read court cases. Several in fact.

“Manson’s leap over the table doesn’t really require much other info to go “probably not safe to have him in court”

Relevance?

Relevant as example of previous statement, you really have some trouble with examples huh?

“Note the avoidance of the Rodney King case, might that be because thinking the defendants are guilty and hating them for that just makes too much sense to ignore?”

Not at all. Clearly the actions committed by the police officers should have been decided criminal in court but when this did not happen, the police officers were innocent. Thus the wrongdoing was done by the court who did not give a guilty verdict.

Btw, this is again an example of two alternatives that both suck (are not perfect) and choosing the least sucky one.

2 of the police officers later were given guilty verdict by a federal court.

We’re perfectly capable of blaming the court and thinking the officers guilty at the same time.

Pecunium’s explanations of “innocent until proven guilty”, this sentence “This is true. I can’t imprison someone who is acquitted of a crime.”, the repeated statement about your hypocritical views, and particularly this:

“No one has to provide alternate theories of why, only show that the one in front of them isn’t working. That’s what peer review is all about.”

and this

“But a couple of your posts ago you complained that all I do is spout my own views? Which is it? I don’t cite studies (I have, you continue to pretend I haven’t, lying seems to be one of the few consistent things about your work), or I won’t give my own opinions?

If I do neither, then what have I been doing for the past two weeks or so?”

Two weeks today btw, you’ve been at this for two weeks. To prove what point? I’d try guessing, and with most people I could within far less than two weeks, but your “arguments” and opinions contradict so often I’m not even sure you know what your point is.

ANd as for Pecunium’s explanation of science in this comment — he’s just explained how you are committing a new fallacy, time for Spot That Fallacy!!

“You, you stick your finger in your ears and pretend that only when a theory which is better (and which you are willing to believe) comes along, that the old one is still functional.”

Nirvana fallacy (perfect solution fallacy) – when solutions to problems are rejected because they are not perfect.

“Do you assume any person thinking they were raped – in fact were raped?” — Did you get to the ones about how cops and DAs respond? If so perhaps, just perhaps, this will make an iota of sense — outside a court of law yes, yes I do.

“Not only once cause if you really wanna be popular in the feminist crown you should say stuff like “I was raped a second time by the police” that is great stuff for a political campaign.”

Provide just one person saying they were raped again by the police, I said revictimized which does not mean “raped again”, it means victimized again. As in, made to be a victim, I already defined “to make” for you, so let me skip to victim —

victim, noun
1. a person who suffers from a destructive or injurious action or agency: a victim of an automobile accident.

“Ohh and do call it “rape survival” although the NORMAL result of rape is not death.”

And now for survival, and survivor, which is what I assume you meant there —

survival, noun
1. the act or fact of surviving, especially under adverse or unusual circumstances.
2. a person or thing that survives or endures, especially an ancient custom, observance, belief, or the like.

survivor, noun
1. a person or thing that survives.
2. Law . the one of two or more designated persons, as joint tenants or others having a joint interest, who outlives the other or others.
3. a person who continues to function or prosper in spite of opposition, hardship, or setbacks.

Note the absence of anything about risk of death.

“Yes cause this information is so much better than the studies I linked and you were highly critical about?”

Try linking to a study that says remotely what you say it says. I tear apart bad studies, not just your studies (Pecunium, would you confirm this please, since you’ve seen me do it to other trolls, thank you)

“However THIS information you believe based on?”

You’re forming your opinions on what rape looks like from the media, so yes, views from real people are an improvement. Yes, I believe what rape looks like is what rape victims say their rape looked like, just how thick are you?

“Well nothing it would seem since they themselves specifically tell they view this as ART, not knowledge. This difference is one of the first things I described here.”

Yeah you continue to misrepresent art, despite having a pair of artists in this debate, trust me, we’ve noticed your idiocy. Art can, and often does, transmit knowledge, particularly when the art form in question is photography.

“Prosecutor doesn’t meet burden of proof, person is found not guilty, but this doesn’t mean they are innocent.” To which you exclaim “Yes!” and then go on to miss the point completely and say that that means they are innocent. Prosecution failing means = not guilty. Not guilty does not mean innocent, it means the burden of proof was not met. Guilty, Not Guilty, and Innocent are three different legal standards —

guilty adj. having been convicted of a crime or having admitted the commission of a crime by pleading “guilty” (saying you did it). A defendant may also be found guilty by a judge after a plea of “no contest,” or in Latin “nolo contendere.” The term “guilty” is also sometimes applied to persons against whom a judgment has been found in a lawsuit for a civil wrong, such as negligence or some intentional act like assault or fraud, but that is a confusing misuse of the word since it should only apply to a criminal charge.

not guilty n. 1) plea of a person who claims not to have committed the crime of which he/she is accused, made in court when arraigned (first brought before a judge) or at a later time set by court. The choices of what one can plea are: guilty, not guilty, no contest, not guilty by reason of insanity, or incompetent to stand trial. 2) verdict after trial by judge sitting without a jury or by jury (unanimous decision in all but two states, which allow a verdict by only 10 of the jurors), stating that the prosecution has not proved the defendant guilty of crime or that it believes the accused person was insane at the time crime was committed. The accused cannot be tried for again for the crime charged.

innocent adj. without guilt (not guilty). Usually the plea which an accused criminal defendant gives to the court at the time of his/her first appearance (or after a continued appearance). Such pleas often disturb the public in cases in which guilt seems obvious from the start. However, everyone is entitled to a fair trial, and the innocent plea gives defense lawyers an opportunity to investigate, find extenuating circumstances, develop reasons punishment should be lenient, bargain with the District Attorney, and let the memories of witnesses fade.

“If a prosecutor doesn’t believe the accused to be guilty (in both the US and the UK) they are obliged to drop the charges. Your example, actually undermines your argument, as the problem in the Duke Case is that the prosecution lacked the means to prove guilt, and so the case was dropped. That Nifong was disbarred is exactly counter to your theory of the way the law works.”

So um yeah, we’re not demanding citations from each other because we agree, and in many cases have already seen the relevant citations (and in the cases we haven’t, or I haven’t anyways, the point is so irrelevant to anything on topic that there’s no need for citing tangents).

“You can’t, so you are flailing. (this is completely different from the problem of your self-serving definition of rape, and your lies about the evidence in the case against Assange; note, BTW, that I’ve not said one word about his guilt or innocence. Nor, actually, has Argenti. You, for some reason, seem to think that the actual evidence needs to be suppressed. A more cynical man than I might think that was because you think those facts actually indicate guilt. Such a, more cynical man, might think you were engaging in avoidant behavior, to keep himself from admitting that practices he engages [or would, given the opportunity] are those of a rapist).”

I am more cynical than you apparently. I will still give our peddler of fish the benefit of the doubt that it’s “would engage in” not “has engaged in” but yeah, the defense mechanisms are high in this one.

Utterly tangential, but how well do you know Lizzie Borden’s case? Iirc she was convinced in public opinion mostly because she didn’t faint when she found the bodies, like a proper Victorian lady would have.

Argenti, you’ve caused me to do some reading up on Lizzie Borden. I recommend Robertson, C. W. (1996) Representing Miss Lizzie: Cultural Convictions in the Trial of Lizzie Borden. Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities (8), 351-416.

According to Robertson, Borden’s “self-possession” both immediately after the discovery of the bodies, and during her trial, were seen as a more significant indicator of her guilt than the fact that she stood to inherit more than $150K. So, you have a good memory!

But then this gets into a huge philisophical discussion about how to make the adversarial system fair, whether there are any workable alternatives to the adversarial system–in terms of history, it’s a fairly new idea, and we know that it’s worlds better than what it replaced. But does that make it the best?

uh, there are plenty of available alternatives, some of which have features to recommend them over adversarial courts. relevant to the current discussion- iirc continental courts using inquisitorial systems actually have a lower rate of false convictions than adversarial courts. where are you getting that adversarial courts are clearly better than other systems?

LOL, longwinded troll thinks that double jeopardy applies to how a person is judged in the court of public opinion. If a court finds someone not guilty, then the general public is legally obliged to agree. What is he planning to do with people who don’t agree with how controversial cases turned out, send them to jail for not agreeing?

I’m gradually coming to the conclusion that this person is about 12-15 years old. He consistently displays a level of moral reasoning that most people have outgrown by late adolescence. If he’s an adult then I’m kind of embarrassed for him.

Cassandra — you missed where he said — “You were discussing whether or not he was guilty of a crime. You cant treat him as guilty if the court declare him innocent. We dont have “thought laws” so feel happy to think he is a criminal.”

Basically implying that thinking someone guilty is somehow forcing “thought laws” on people by thinking them guilty, or something. I really can’t parse it considering that insisting everyone must agree with the court decisions is actually endorsing “thought laws”.

Sharculese — I think Howard is referring specifically to the USA’s system, not adversarial systems in general. That’d imply he wasn’t speaking of all other systems, just “what came before” (that whole “taxation without representation” problem), and “fairly new” as in “since 1776~”. I might be wrong on that, but that’s how I’d read what he said.

cloudiah — interesting, of course the Yale archives don’t have it online, but interesting all the same.

Btw, he brought up the Duke case, and “innocent until proven guilty”. And I checked Swedish newspapers before saying Assange was being charged with rape, on the assumption he knew his own laws — he was flat out lying. (And that’s how we ended up down this particular rabbithole, I actually fact checked his claim and yet again it was lies, fallacies, and seriously twisting things, combined with rape apologia)

The rape apologia though is really the problem here. Things like —

“How do you know which rapes in Project Unbreaklable are real rapes? Do you assume any person thinking they were raped – in fact were raped? The first thing I checked was the ability to control context and content. They do not even answer that question. ”

Thus he can discount Project Unbreakable entirely. Even though he’s already said that rape requires force, which it doesn’t, under Swedish law (I checked back when that came up). Even though he said rape by coercion was a thing made up by feminists to um…score political points or something? He never did explain that one.

Sorry if this is coming off as cross with you Sharculese, my anger is directed at his repeated, insistent, victim blaming and rape apologia, after 2 weeks of it my ability to be polite is long gone.

Yeah, I saw the bit about thought crime, which just adds an extra layer of absurdity. People being allowed to disagree with government decisions – not imposing thought crime laws. People not being allowed to disagree with government decisions in any way – that actually would be setting up thought crime as a category. Stupid troll is very very stupid.

“No, the public can’t make a legal decision on whether or not someone is guilty or pass out a punishment for a crime. You agree, though, that the public can think whatever they want about a case.”

Yes people can think whatever they want. That was the point with me saying we do not have “thought crime”. You can think whatever you want. You are just not allowed acting upon whatever you think. This is obvious when looking at racism.

“It’s okay for Nancy Grace to say she believes Casey Anthony is guilty of murder, but she doesn’t have the legal authority to punish Anthony.”

No thats not ok at all! Nancy Grace shóuld be hit with lawsuit and given guilty verdict for libel. The harm she cause to people is far greater than any need for idiot pretend judges residing over a pretend court. Also after her bullshit regarding Duke Lacrosse case that chicken coward wasnt even on the show when the players were announce innocent. What was it the irresposible idiot said now again. Well here it is:

“Why would you go to a cop in an alleged gang rape case, say, and lie and give misleading information?”

Cause of knowing idiots in media like Nancy Grace make you a national star perhaps? The point is you do not even need the answer to WHY some people lie. Knowing that they do is enough. Every legal case is unique and begins with the word innocent. Off course many feminists wanna do the opposite. Every rape begins with rape and the accused must prove rape did not happen. After all – this is the feminist logic on sexual harassment. Prove it did not happen or we assume you guilty as shown by Daphne Patai in her book “Heterophobia”

“Again, there are no thought crimes, so private citizens can think what they want to think.”

Yes, including racism! However people having racist thought are not allowed to act upon those thoughts shouting whatever they think about a black person in media so why should other bias be allowed in the media?

“I also have freedom of speech. I am allowed to say I think OJ is guilty even though he was acquitted. I am not treating him as a criminal. I am not giving him a legal punishment like a court can. I’m just saying what I believe is true.”

As a private person you are allowed to say that yes. However I would be hard pressed to find a single intelligent reason for media people in the public to be allowed to stir up lynch mobs so they can make more money. Its not like they risk anything by being wrong. People remember the right and forget the wrong – thats the reason its even possible to have TV-shows about people talking to the dead.

“Since her show began in 2005, the presumption of innocence has found a willful enemy in the former prosecutor turned broadcast judge-and-jury.”

“Of course private citizens are not allowed to punish people they believe to be criminals. That’s vigilantism, and it’s illegal. They are allowed to say they think they’re guilty, though.”

In what way is being nationally declared a child murderer NOT a punishment? You should really not be allowed to do it in public cause the system was created long before our era of media obsession. The point once in a time was to get AWAY from lynch mobs and public opinion. Now we are on our way back to medieval kinds of justice based ón some news crews needing more money for their beach house.

“Nancy Grace, a former prosecutor whose nightly attacks on the woman she scornfully referred to as Tot Mom almost single-handedly inflated the Anthony case from a routine local murder into a national obsession.”

Thus I ask again, what public opinion?

“In a country with a free press, people are going to talk and write a lot of opinions on high profile court cases.”

Reporting ongoing court cases – perfectly fine

“The first lesson he learned during the Simpson trial, Finkelstein said, was that a lawyer analyzing a trial has to restrain the kneejerk impulse to act as an advocate. “I always tried to give both sides, the way a defense attorney sees it and the way a prosecutor sees it,” he said.”

Pretend-Overturning court decisions cause you are a big star and think cause you are famous you know better – not ok. Its bad enough the increase of idiots killing kids at schools cause they know media makes a big thing about it. US press being the main culprit for causing more school shootings.

“When someone famous like Assange gets accused of a crime, it gets a lot of media coverage, and the general public is going to form their own opinions.”

What general public? You are talking about a few priviliged twice-biased (political and financial) media persons deciding what most people know. Most people do not even have an opinion on the case. They have an opinion on the information media thought they should know about.

“Sometimes a person will be acquitted of a crime, and the public will still dislike hir. I don’t know how you can prevent that without taking away the freedom of press and freedom of speech.”

You can like/dislike whoever you want. However if you claim an innocent person is really guilty you should be hit with a lawsuit for libel.

“It would be dangerous to allow governments to arrest people in secret, too. If court cases were held in secret, then governments could abuse that power and start prosecuting people for made up crimes.”

I am not saying court cases should be held in secret. I am saying their verdict should be respected cause even a sucky system creates less robberies, murder and mayhem than the complete lack of one. When Africa was colonized murder and mayhem decreased even though the colonial powers were oppressive. Even their racist idiot system created less murder than the earlier lack of any system.

“It’s better to have public scrutiny for our criminal justice system.”

What public? Media only cares about money. If media think they make money on declaring an innocent person guilty they will do so – even when they know that person is innocent (as in no evidence). They do not give a shit. This is what Nancy Grace said:

“she stated that Ricci was “a known ex-con, a known felon, and brought suspicion on himself, so who could blame anyone for claiming he was the perpetrator?”

Actually she should have said – Since ratings would go up – it was easy money!

“(And that’s how we ended up down this particular rabbithole, I actually fact checked his claim and yet again it was lies, fallacies, and seriously twisting things, combined with rape apologia)”

You treat legal theory as legal fact. However courts decide legal practise. If a law is badly written it can still be interpreted in a functional way. Courts need not be idiots cause the people writing a law feared lobby groups wrath.

“Thus he can discount Project Unbreakable entirely.”

Actually I dont need to discount it cause it did not count in the first place since they THEMSELVES declare it to be an ARTPROJECT! Also your complete lack of analysis is very interesting considering how closely you have analysed other sources.

“Even though he’s already said that rape requires force, which it doesn’t, under Swedish law (I checked back when that came up).”

I said it requires being forced, I did not say it requires use of physical force.

“Even though he said rape by coercion was a thing made up by feminists to um…score political points or something? He never did explain that one.”

See same newspaper

“This is because a vocal and uncritical public opinion, which is fixed at just the word rape, succeeded in bringing about a new legislation. No one seems to have reflected on the implications, although these have been known.”
also

“It is possible that it providing better victim status to be raped than sexually abused, especially in these times when more and damages imposed. But it is absurd that the victim should get to control crime of.”

Re: Nancy Grace, libel, why the media can do that, etc — this one probably is uniquely American, but that’s the relevant law for her show — our libel laws just don’t work that way, it’s basically impossible to have grounds for a libel suit here. As to why the media is allowed to say whatever it likes, that’s explicitly stated in the Constitution. As for ghost shows and other such fantasy, that’s exactly what it is, fantasy, a genre of entertainment (weren’t you going on about entertainment back on day 1 here?) — And whether Nancy Grace is a terrible person who should find a new job is moot to whether any American law can force her to (we can’t, our first amendment bans it).

I cannot properly explain our libel laws while that fucking fire alarm is going off! ANd the fucking thing keeps shutting off only to make me jump again a minute later…80 db is white noise my fucking ass… (This has nothing to do with anything besides being the cause of my brief reply)

“What general public? You are talking about a few priviliged twice-biased (political and financial) media persons deciding what most people know. Most people do not even have an opinion on the case. They have an opinion on the information media thought they should know about.”

That’s basically been the case throughout history, or at least as far back as I know (see the part re: Lizzie Borden) — and the point of the aforementioned first amendment is, in theory, to ensure all sides are reported on (in practice there’s no safeguard against yellow journalism). Sweden has gag orders I assume? We don’t. It would be more illegal to force Nancy Grace off the air than it is for her to say what she says, whether she should really choose to knock it off is another matter though. Our libel laws basically give her a free pass as long as she says “I think…” I there, and even in her “I KNOW!!” style it could only be libel if you knows it to be patently untrue. In any case, we only have civil defamation laws, so the worst that could happen to her would be a really big fine.

“When Africa was colonized murder and mayhem decreased even though the colonial powers were oppressive.”

That shit needs a citation, badly.

“Yes, I did. Good luck attacking me on this one. I noticed the absense of commentary though.”

Maybe the lack of commentary was because I was simply explaining how we ended up discussing American law? I kind of thought that was clear in context — that entire comment was an explanation to Sharculese as to why everyone is being so cross with you, a summary of the current derail. No, I didn’t comment on the summary, that wouldn’t be much of a summary.

“You treat legal theory as legal fact. However courts decide legal practise. If a law is badly written it can still be interpreted in a functional way. Courts need not be idiots cause the people writing a law feared lobby groups wrath.”

Says someone treating the law as the standard for public opinion…and peddling fish again, what’s that point at the end about lobby groups?

“Actually I dont need to discount it cause it did not count in the first place since they THEMSELVES declare it to be an ARTPROJECT! Also your complete lack of analysis is very interesting considering how closely you have analysed other sources.”

Or maybe I was half asleep and typing out all that html was enough effort? That was 20+ of html for all those links, which you appear to have ignored, and thus failed “being a decent human being 101″. And I’m not analyzing art with anyone unable to understand that art can transmit knowledge, mostly because my minor was studio arts, been there, done that, holy shit does it make my head hurt (and that fire alarm is still going off, I don’t need a bigger headache [20 min and counting, argh!!]).

“I said it requires being forced, I did not say it requires use of physical force.”

Yes, I noticed. And Pecunium mocked. Would you like to provide another verb does not equal noun example? Being shot does not require shooting? Being attacked does not require attacking? Being coerced does not require coercion? (That last one was what you were really trying to say huh? Or was it that coercion cannot be rape despite your own laws saying force is not required for a rape case?)

“But it is absurd that the victim should get to control crime of.”

HAHAHAHA oh, sorry, did you not realize nearly every crime (at least in the US) requires someone, usually the victim, pressing charges? IDK, maybe in Sweden if you assault someone they can’t opt out of pressing charges, but here they can, thus this wouldn’t be absurd, if it was really what rape by coercion meant, but it isn’t.

Oh wait, nevermind, you presented someone else’s opinion, so by your own nonsense I can ignore you until you present your own opinion. Remember that it must be on what should happen, not what must not happen.

And google translate is failing terribly on that article, want to actually translate the important parts? (Or, even better, fix google’s translation? Please fix google’s translation, and that isn’t snark.)

I really can’t tell if that opinion article is trying to say the changed rape law is too harsh, or just unclear. I assume that’s a translation issue. What I can make out of it is comparing what Americans would call “assault with a deadly weapon” with stat rape of a 13-14 year old.

Under Connecticut law that would be this versus this. So it does sound like the Swedish sentence lengths are reverse what they should be (ie assault with a deadly weapon should be worse) — but that doesn’t make complex rape laws invalid (CT doesn’t have a crime called rape, they use degrees of sexual assault).

And despite the legal gibberish those laws look like, they make sense to lawyers.

Speaking of them being gibberish, I think this is actually the relevant sexual assault law — twice the sentence as assault with a deadly weapon, matching the newer Swedish rape law (in ratio though not length).

So it’s not just Sweden that thinks having sex with minors is worse than stabbing someone.

“Do you assume any person thinking they were raped – in fact were raped?”

“Did you get to the ones about how cops and DAs respond?”

You mean how they allegedly responded to an alleged rape? You dont know if the response is true. Also you dont even know what they responded to. They control the story completely and you just have to go on whatever they tell you, specially if its in accordance with already held views.

“If so perhaps, just perhaps, this will make an iota of sense — outside a court of law yes, yes I do.“

Yes it makes perfect sense in case what you call “rape” is not even a crime. Its instead whatever gives the person the impression they were raped – Doing that is not even automatically illegal but calling it rape makes perfect sense in a propaganda sort of way, where most people assume when you say rape you mean the crime-kind rape, not the other kind.

“You’re forming your opinions on what rape looks like from the media, so yes, views from real people are an improvement.”

You are assuming things, I actually have real rape victims in my family and know way more about the suject than I care to discuss with people at a public forum.

“Yes, I believe what rape looks like is what rape victims say their rape looked like, just how thick are you?”

You dont even know which persons are real rape victims. You just use the word “rape” as a metaphor for a woman feeling raped, and second raped. The purpose of Project Unbreakable is to be able to claim rape WITHOUT having to first prove it happened at all. It doesnt matter the slightest to you whether a claimed rape is a real rape cause its more convienent to call ALL claimed rapes real rapes. In that case it makes perfect sense.

“Yeah you continue to misrepresent art, despite having a pair of artists in this debate trust me, we’ve noticed your idiocy. Art can, and often does, transmit knowledge, particularly when the art form in question is photography.”

Art doesnt have any criterum for representation. Thus artists need not care whether the art gives a representative view of the world OR whether it just make people believe something is far worse (more common) than it is.

“So it’s not just Sweden that thinks having sex with minors is worse than stabbing someone.”

You are probably missing the point with that part, however thats a swedish thing.

Sweden have the minor sex-age at 15 – not 18. There is no “stat. rape” in Sweden. Thus the law says if somebody have sex with a 14 year old in Sweden thats rape. With a 15 year old its perfectly legal. Prosecutor Hillegren informs us in the absurdity of there not being a middle ground on this since nobody thinks a 20 year old having consensual sex with a 14 year old is worse than being stabbed in the chest.

Sweden HAD a middle ground on this “sexual abuse” however feminists removed it (by shoting and lobbying) cause frankly they wanna call everything rape feminists in the media treated guilty verdict of sexual abuse as “innocent” if the perp was not convicted of rape, feminists were not happy. Hillegren tells us the consequence of this being they get the lesser punishment of sexual assault yet its recorded as rape. Cause even if you call it rape – you cant give it same sentence as if they hade put a knife to the persons throat and forced intercourse. The punishment must be proportional to other punishments of worse things.

I THINK ArkTroll is part of the “rape rape” crowd: i.e. the ONLY TRUE RAPE is that done by an EVIL CLEARLY EVIL BECUZ DEFORMED stranger who young and beautiful CERTIFIED VIRGIN as she’s walking home from church and beats the crap out of her.

Everything else is only being called rape because those awful feminists hate men and want to punish them for having MANLY SEX.

“I THINK ArkTroll is part of the “rape rape” crowd: i.e. the ONLY TRUE RAPE is that done by an EVIL CLEARLY EVIL BECUZ DEFORMED stranger who young and beautiful CERTIFIED VIRGIN as she’s walking home from church and beats the crap out of her.”

WTF?! What are you talking about? I never even talked about real rape in terms of who the claimed victim is (couldnt care less) or who the alleged perpetrator is (also uninportant). Thats pure bullshit! What I said was you gotta separate stories about feeling raped from people proven to being raped. This is done in several different categories

1. Police agree, however they inform the person what happened was not a rape but just a guy being a jerk, no trial
2. Police agree, it was a rape however they cant find the suspect, no trial
3. Police agree, it was rape, the suspect is found and charged, not guilty (lack of evidence)
4. Police agree, it was rape, the suspect is found and charged, guilty – goes directly to jail without collecting 2000£
5. Police agree, it was rape, lack of evidence, no trial
6. Police disagree, the rape is unfounded, no trial
7. Police disagree, the story is false, accusor might be charged and put on trial

At 5/7 points the police agrees, however at 4/7 points police agree a rape did happen, When a rape did happen its either guilty/innocent at trial, cant find suspect or do not have enough evidence to present at trial. The remaining two are no basis for rape or evidence pointing the rape being false.

At no point in this does it matter who the victim is or who the suspect is.

“Everything else is only being called rape because those awful feminists hate men and want to punish them for having MANLY SEX.”

In sweden we have three different sex crimes. 1. Sexual misconduct, 2. Sexual abuse, 3. Rape, what feminists did (And prosecutor Hillegren tells about) is how feminists shouted to get people who would be judged for sexual abuse to be convicted of rape. This has two consequences:

A. For lesser sex crimes they are charged for rape but the punishment is still the one you would give for sexual abuse. We just call it rape, we do not treat it the same way we would treat a rape. The rape statistics is way inflated due to this.

B. Rape is harder to prove, people who would have been convicted of sexual abuse might go free cause of feminists insisting we call everything rape.

“You are a vile little rape apologist, Arks.”

As I informed earlier, in this definition where everyone feeling raped is assumed to be raped (PU). Rape is not even defined as a crime. Its defined as whatever gives a woman the feeling of being offended. For instance a guy cheating on her makes her feel raped cause had she known he would cheat she would never have given consent.

As I informed earlier, in this definition where everyone feeling raped is assumed to be raped (PU). Rape is not even defined as a crime. Its defined as whatever gives a woman the feeling of being offended. For instance a guy cheating on her makes her feel raped cause had she known he would cheat she would never have given consent.

“Take a man and a woman who know each other and the woman says she doesn’t feel like it today, but the man just goes ahead anyway. Sure, it is not very nice, but maybe not worth two years in prison. It is more like a regulatory offence,” he said.

Actually his “innocent until proven guilty” routine is sadly not special. It’s a long-used tactic of the rape denialist/apologist/encouragist.

If the accused must be presumed to be factually (as opposed to legally) innocent, the obverse is also true, which means the accuser is factually false; until she is vindicated by a court of law declaring him guilty.

It makes rape (and DV) a different class of crime, since they are nothing like this adamant about the innocence of “thug-boys” all presumed to be clandestine criminals.

Utterly tangential, but how well do you know Lizzie Borden’s case? Iirc she was convinced in public opinion mostly because she didn’t faint when she found the bodies, like a proper Victorian lady would have.

Pretty well. I’d say the odds are high she did it. The circumstantial evidence is strong, and (barring the random double ax-murderer wandering around unnoticed, there isn’t really any viable candidate for the crime). No one who had any motive appears in the alternate theories of the case.

So, all in all, I’m unconvinced she didn’t do it. I also think the issue of “her bearing” is easier for most people who had a, “gut reaction” that she did it to use as after the fact justification. The prosecution failed to convince the jury, and now those who thought her guilty had to say why.

Sharculese: No, I’m not yelling at him for that. I’m telling him off for telling me how my system works (note his use of Duke as his example of the evils of the system).

That, and his lying about what the charges (and Swedish Law) were in the Assange case.

Argenti: I’d say “assault” with a deadly weapon often deserves a lesser sentence than rape. Assault (in the US) usually equals something akin to “making a credible threat” not actually attacking/injuring. So waving a 2×4, or pointing a gun at someone (loaded or not) = assault with a deadly weapon.

Aktivarum: Yes people can think whatever they want. That was the point with me saying we do not have “thought crime”. You can think whatever you want. You are just not allowed acting upon whatever you think

Now you are lying about what you said. You’ve been telling us we can’t say/think anyone is guilty until they are convicted, and that an acquittal = innocence, and that anyone who says otherwise is wrong, morally, and legally.

Which you do again in your very next, “argument” about Nancy Grace.

Yes, I did. Good luck attacking me on this one. I noticed the absense of commentary though.

More lies, unless you mean that you noticed that you didn’t respond to the commentary you got in response to the mistakes you made about it.

I said it requires being forced, I did not say it requires use of physical force.

And every form of force which isn’t physical you say isn’t real force*. You say that when a person manages to force someone, through means other than the physical, it shows the victim actually consented.

Call that a misreprentation of fact, not quite a lie, no matter that it’s practical effect is worse than an outright lie.

*I am being generous there, because the, “force doesn’t equal force” nonsense you were spouting was stupid beyond words. Either you don’t know how language works, or thought that pseudo-philosophical lexical gibberish would bedazzle us, and keep us from seeing that you were saying forcing someone to have sex wasn’t really forcing them to have sex.

Anyone who thinks there was a “lack of any system” in pre-colonial Africa is racist and ignorant, so we can add that to his rape-apologism as further testament to the terrible character of this long-winded troll. Less murder? Oh yeah, King Leopold was such a benevolent bringer of civilization to the those uncivilized people…

“You mean how they allegedly responded to an alleged rape? You dont know if the response is true. Also you dont even know what they responded to. They control the story completely and you just have to go on whatever they tell you, specially if its in accordance with already held views.”

That last sentence applies to you as well — you don’t believe a rape occurred unless someone is found guilty, ergo I can only assume that even if you knew the person who said it was rape, you’d claim “well I only have your story to go on”. Which is yet more rape apologia.

And I know enough people who have been raped, and enough newspaper articles quoting the police and DAs directly, to have no reason to doubt their stories — eg the idiot cop who said that quote that started the slutwalks.

On January 24, 2011 Constable Michael Sanguinetti spoke on crime prevention at a York University safety forum at Osgoode Hall Law School.[8][9] He said: “I’ve been told I’m not supposed to say this – however, women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.”[9]

Thus it’s perfectly believable a cop would ask what she was wearing. And I gave links to so fucking many because even if some of them are lying, statistically it is incredibly doubtful they all are.

“Yes it makes perfect sense in case what you call “rape” is not even a crime. Its instead whatever gives the person the impression they were raped – Doing that is not even automatically illegal but calling it rape makes perfect sense in a propaganda sort of way, where most people assume when you say rape you mean the crime-kind rape, not the other kind.”

And more rape apologia! Sweden, I assume, has one set of laws for the entire country? The US has state by state laws, meaning what’s rape in one state may not be in another –it’s still rape though. This isn’t some propaganda trick but an attempt to reconcile the differences in the laws. Eg, those CT laws I quoted? One state over in Massachusetts state rape is a strict over 18 with under 18 thing, meaning if you turn 18 a mere week before your partner, it would be legally rape to have sex during that week — attempting to reconcile the differences in law is required to have any coherency to what is being discussed.

Oh and not having consent? Unethical regardless what the laws of your state/country may say — what constitutes consent may vary between cultures, but given what’s been said of the Assange case, your culture has similar enough views on consent for me to say — you, personally, need some clue she’s consenting to be acting ethically when you have sex. And the easiest way to be sure you have consent? Ask. (You do get that something like “oh baby I want to fuck you so hard” would be asking right? This doesn’t need to be some boner killing “now, before we proceed, are we legally clear you’re consenting?”)

“after I survived physical rape at the hands of a criminal, I survived psychic rape, if you’ll pardon the phrase, at the hands of the people I had trusted implicitly to protect and help me.”

You missed the important clause there.

“Prior research suggests that rape survivors may experience victim-blaming treatment from system personnel (termed secondary victimization or the second rape).”

How does “secondary victimization” have nothing to do with the definition of victimization?! Would you like a definition of secondary to round it out, or can you work that one out on your own? I’d imagine you know the meaning of secondary already.

I tear apart bad studies because they attempt to be The Ultimate Truth (and yours didn’t even say what you claimed they did, the second one was a solid study, just not saying anything like what you claimed) — I presented Project Unbreakable as representative of how rape actually looks to the victims. I made no attempt to say what percent of rapes look like which Project Unbreakable statements (that would be an Ultimate Truth claim).

I can’t imagine you need studies on every sports game to form opinions, watching a few dozen soccer (football) games would give you a good representation of how the game works. (That’s an example of a similar thing, a note I make since you’ve had serious issues with previous examples.)

“You are assuming things, I actually have real rape victims in my family and know way more about the suject than I care to discuss with people at a public forum.”

And you believe their stories because their reliable reporters on other matters? But somehow their rapes were the statistically less likely stranger attacks? That’s possible, of course, but statistically it’s more likely that victims, plural, means at least one was either assaulted by a boyfriend/husband/etc, or drugged/drunk at the time. If the only thing that makes their stories more believable is that you already know them, that’s still rape apologia — it means you’d pull this “we have only your word” on similar stories from people you aren’t related to, and that’s inconsistent, at best.

“You dont even know which persons are real rape victims. You just use the word “rape” as a metaphor for a woman feeling raped, and second raped. The purpose of Project Unbreakable is to be able to claim rape WITHOUT having to first prove it happened at all. It doesnt matter the slightest to you whether a claimed rape is a real rape cause its more convienent to call ALL claimed rapes real rapes. In that case it makes perfect sense.”

..that’s not what the word metaphor means, should I get out the dictionary again? Considering everything else you’ve said, I suspect the only thing that would prove a rape occurred would be a court conviction. Maybe Sweden has a better conviction rate, but the US’s sucks — we’ve had newspaper verified reports of women told they’re making it up, only to later find pictures of them in a serial rapist’s photo collection. So no, I don’t trust our cops to pursue rape cases, and if they won’t even take a report, then using a conviction to call it a “proven rape” (and only the conviction) is, at best, asinine. In your case I suspect it’s intentional rape apologia.

*ignores the red herring and appeals to emotion* Wtf is “attention-therapy”? No, seriously, what is that red herring? My best guess is you mean Rogerian person centered therapy, and idk about in Sweden, but that’s not what most psychs here practice.

“Art doesnt have any criterum for representation. Thus artists need not care whether the art gives a representative view of the world OR whether it just make people believe something is far worse (more common) than it is.”

Need to care, as in required? No. Never ever do care? Bullshit. And again, idk about in Sweden, but the CDC (and other studies) have found about 1 in 5 American women will be raped within her lifetime. Oh wait, nevermind, the CDC only asks if they were raped, they don’t cross check with police records and violate the anonymity a study like that requires. (Note, “a study like that” means “personally sensitive data that the person may not be honest about without anonymity” — any report you see about the rate of homosexuality is the same method…or can people effectively self report that but not rape?)

Re: Swedish rape law — it’s like the MA law above with the strict 18 over-under cutoff? Feminists are usually in favor of the “Romeo and Juliet” law version (what CT uses). Idk enough on your laws to say the change wasn’t because of feminists, but to blame all feminists, including ones with no ties to your country, is just a bit asshole. (It’s also a fallacy btw)

“There is no “stat. rape” in Sweden. Thus the law says if somebody have sex with a 14 year old in Sweden thats rape.”

Stat rape is short for statutory rape, meaning rape under the statutes because consent is moot, minors cannot consent — your definition of minor will vary, but that’s still stat rape (CT doesn’t have either stat rape or rape in title, they use degrees of sexual assault, everyone not a lawyer still says stat rape and rape though).

No thats not ok at all! Nancy Grace shóuld be hit with lawsuit and given guilty verdict for libel. The harm she cause to people is far greater than any need for idiot pretend judges residing over a pretend court.

Nancy Grace is in the US, and under US law, she is not guilty of libel. Argenti Aertheri already explained why, because Grace said those were her opinions. I don’t know if that would be the same with Sweden’s free speech and libel laws, though.

Yes, including racism! However people having racist thought are not allowed to act upon those thoughts shouting whatever they think about a black person in media so why should other bias be allowed in the media?

Hate speech is against the law in other countries, but it’s protected speech in the US. That’s why groups like the Westboro Baptist Church can picket funerals with hateful signs. I know other countries ban them, though. So if a US journalist wants to be racist on air, zie could legally. I’m not saying it’s right either. I’m just saying what is allowed under the First Amendment in the US.

“Nancy Grace, a former prosecutor whose nightly attacks on the woman she scornfully referred to as Tot Mom almost single-handedly inflated the Anthony case from a routine local murder into a national obsession.”

I agree that Grace gives one sided accounts of court cases. She is very strongly pro prosecution, and she can be a jerk about it, too. That doesn’t mean she’s guilty of libel under US law, though, and as long as her show gets good ratings, it will stay on the air.

Sharculese said this

actually, this page just has all kinds of anglo-centrism going on. are y’all really yelling at the swedish dude for not thinking about criminal justice from a common law perspective?

This might be a source of confusion here. We’re trying to compare legal systems and the
media from different countries, and what’s true in the US is not necessarily true in Sweden.

“What I said was you gotta separate stories about feeling raped from people proven to being raped. This is done in several different categories”

See the above referenced example of how “rape occurred, for sure, proven later, but police refused to take the report” — that’s probably the most common category.

You also missed — rape occurred, but the victim doesn’t report it to avoid having to face their rapists in court // to avoid having their entire sex life dragged through the mud // because the US’s rape conviction rate is abysmal.

“At no point in this does it matter who the victim is or who the suspect is.”

Unless Swedish police are required to take all reports, it has bearing on how the police respond.

Howard — two options with the “halfway punishment” thing — either he wants “Romeo and Juliet” laws, or he’s pulling yet more rape apologia. Considering my home state has “Romeo and Juliet” laws, and only uses sexual assault, and I already explained that, the whole “when it’s just sexual assault” thing probably means rape apologia, again.

“Because his golden age era was one where as long as you didn’t hold a knife to her throat you got off easy, no matter what else you might do.”

From what I can follow if his legal views, that sounds about right.

Pecunium —

“Actually his “innocent until proven guilty” routine is sadly not special. It’s a long-used tactic of the rape denialist/apologist/encouragist.”

Well yes, they just aren’t usually so amazingly self-contradictory about it (you know I marvel at the level of cognitive dissonance some people are capable of, that was more the point of that line).

Re: Lizzie Borden, I suspect she probably did do it, I just find it odd most people, even now, assume she was convicted, and based on what? Public opinion that not fainting meant she was guilty? Your answer of “because of the other evidence” makes sense, versus the people who go “wait, she wasn’t found guilty?” — I’m sorry, it’s 90 degrees here and my brain is jello, please pardon my half nonsense reply, it is any less muggy there? (or are you still away and thus not suffering in this heat?)

Re: assault — his example seemed to be actually stabbing someone, so that was the law I checked, CT uses degrees for that as well, and the type of assault you’re referencing is threatening and a misdemeanor. If I followed his example, it was saying that stabbing someone in the abdomen is treated as a less serious crime than having sex with a minor (and this is because of some feminist conspiracy). So I checked CT law, because it’s very easy to search, and pulled the closest matching laws — still not really the same laws as Sweden doesn’t seem to have “Romeo and Juliet” laws, but close enough.

The sentence for threatening (what CT calls assault without injury) is way less than most sexual assault sentences though, yeah.

Re: his use of the word force — it isn’t even just that not physical force isn’t force, but that physical force where maybe she could’ve fought him off can’t be force (the first woman in the Assange case, all that shit about how she’s bigger than him so how could he pin her?!?!!)

Aktivarum re: Myoo and cloudiah — citation needed, that’s all I’m saying on that, since swearing at you will surely just cause you to ignore me. Particularly, show that there was no system in pre-colonial Africa (you’ll have to discount all forms of justice used by every single tribe to do this, so good luck!)

uh, there are plenty of available alternatives, some of which have features to recommend them over adversarial courts. relevant to the current discussion- iirc continental courts using inquisitorial systems actually have a lower rate of false convictions than adversarial courts. where are you getting that adversarial courts are clearly better than other systems?

You’re right–I’m being anglo-centric–not just anglo-centric, but pretty damned USA-centric.

I’m going to go quietly to my room and think about the privilege involved in that and maybe later talk about the way the USA system has tied itself into a knot of ‘this is the only way, this is the exact same way as folks in all civilized places do things, do you want to be barbarians.’

…which I should have known, given that not ten minutes ago I was ranting my head off someplace else about the way our prisons are set up, and how we pretend it’s the same elsewhere when it’s really not.

Pecunium — just as hot up there huh? ick! I do not do heat, I think I’m going to dump a ice cube tray into the fish tank, and then the rest into my water bottle, it is way too early for the tank to be hitting 90 >.< (I'll survive, the fish may actually not, I already lost one to a combo of this heat and old age)

A…is for the ass from which you pull your facts!
K…is for the knowledge you completely lack!
T…is for the thought you cannot do!
I…is for the ICK that you can do and do do!
V…is for this verse that you inspire!
A…is for the arguments that you retire!
R…is for the rules of evo-psych you lovingly recite!
U…is for the unique stamina you have that really bites!
M…is for the muck you’ve trucked to this site!

Prior research suggests that rape survivors may experience victim-blaming treatment from system personnel (termed secondary victimization or the second rape).

Here’s the entire abstract, instead of just the one sentence he liked —

Although prevention efforts aimed at eliminating the occurrence of sexual assault are clearly needed, it is also important to consider how we can prevent further trauma among those already victimized. Prior research suggests that rape survivors may experience victim-blaming treatment from system personnel (termed secondary victimization or the second rape). This research examined how postassault contact with community systems exacerbated rape victims’ psychological and physical health distress. Findings revealed that the majority of rape survivors who reported their assault to the legal or medical system did not receive needed services. These difficulties with service delivery were associated with both perceived and objective measures of negative health outcomes. Contact with the mental health system, rape crisis centers, or religious communities was generally perceived by victims as beneficial. This study suggests that the trauma of rape extends far beyond the assault itself, as negative community responses can significantly elevate distress.

But that doesn’t mean “made to be a victim again” and thus my defining “victim” for you is irrelevant? The mind, it boggles. (And I see you’ve resorted to citing things behind a paywall so I can’t pick apart their method, or only when the study actually says the inverse of what you claim?)

kirbywarp — try violating the laws of physics? Except even then I’d be wary of flat out discounting it, given that the mentally ill are often not believed and also victims of crime more often than the not mentally ill — sure the laws of physics parts would be an embellishment, but that doesn’t mean that no rape occurred…yeah I’ve got nothing. Anyways, by Aktiarum’s standard a rape didn’t occur unless a rapist is convicted (does a murder not occur if a murderer isn’t convicted? o.O?)

This is one of the funniest cases of sexism in action I’ve seen in ages. So, to summarise = trollboy thinks that the fact that feminists tend to believe women who say they’ve been raped is terribly upsetting and offensive. In the interests of fairness, he wants to instead automatically assume that anyone who says she’s* been raped is mistaken (he’s too cowardly to say “lying”) unless she is able to successfully prosecute her rapist and secure a conviction. Instead of instinctively siding with the accuser, he would have us instinctively side with the accused. Which, like everyone who proposes this idea, he thinks is more fair than the other way around.

*I’m guessing that if the victim was a man he’d somehow manage to dredge up a bit more empathy.

“I’m guessing that if the victim was a man he’d somehow manage to dredge up a bit more empathy.”

Either he didn’t go through those Project Unbreakable links, or that’s incorrect — I included some male victims (admittedly only a few, as most of their signs did include references to force, and trollboy seems to acknowledge rape by force, and only by force, but yeah, they’re there).

The rest sounds right though, except not just “more fair than the other way around” but some sort of feminist propaganda campaign.

I don’t think he’s 12-15 though btw, his English is too good, particularly considering I would guess it’s his second language. I’m thinking more like “oh gods are you a frosh?” myself (though, in practice, my only real issue with the frosh is they bring all sorts of strange germs and I get sick Every. Fucking. Year. as a result)

Amnesia — if I’m generous it simply means that some rapes are legally proven, but most are not, and those are different things; or that there’s what I tend to call “legal rape” though “illegal rape” would be more accurate, and then there’s lack of consent but not illegal where it occurred.

Except he’s said the latter isn’t rape at all but a feminist propaganda campaign. Took two weeks, but I’m beginning to be able to figure out wtf he’s actually trying to say — in this case I’m pretty sure it’s that anything besides legally proven rape isn’t rape, but someone simply “feeling raped” and thus, um…feminist propaganda!!

I think he’s of the opinion that if it isn’t a legally proven rape, it isn’t a rape, and thus there is no rapist, and thus the (probably actually a) rapist was acting ethically. The logical gaps are many, and deep crevices, so I’m only sort of sure on that though. (And I’m trying to answer for him because his answers, as you’ve seen I’m sure, make no goddamned sense, if they’re even answering the question at all)

Aktivarum: “You are assuming things, I actually have real rape victims in my family and know way more about the suject than I care to discuss with people at a public forum.”

Why? What about it is something you don’t want to talk about.

As a point of curiosity, I assume their attackers were convicted, since otherwise you would be inconsistent in your statements about guilt/innocence, and absent a conviction we can’t assume you think a rape occurred.

remember, there can’t be false rape accusations, men are always the abusers, man rape does not exist, misandry does not exist, only women can be harmed, and the woman has 0 responsibilities when the couple fucks up.

I’d just like say that @pecunium, @Argenti Aertheri, @katz, and others have restored my faith in men (and people).

I’m an occasional reader who was just exploring the site, but the aplomb and skill with which you guys eviscerated the troll makes me happy. I didn’t read the whole thing (!) but did a good portion of it and just got fed up with the troll, so ended up reading the responses to it. You guys responded so much better than I could have, my response would have ended in multi-paragraph strings of profanity. You also make me hopeful that I can find a partner, fwb, wev, pal, etc, (unlike troll asserts, I do think about boning my friends, but I also like having friends to begin with) who is as feminist as you are. I’d be happy to buy any of you a drink if you’re ever in good old CA.